I don’t envy developers who remake games, especially those that gamers consider landmark, genre-defining masterpieces like Shining Force. Remakes are all about balance: highlight the good, minimize the bad, and carefully add new content that doesn’t pull focus from what made the original special. These are the basics; however, there’s an unnamable quality, too—I’m going to call it spirit—that developers also must respect. If too much is changed, those changes dilute the original’s spirit. If not enough is changed, gamers will wonder why they should bother with the remake.
The idea of spirit is essential to my experience of Shining Force: Resurrection of the Dark Dragon, a remake of the original Shining Force for the Game Boy Advance. I’ve played it and the original before, but I am in no way an expert in the ways they differ. We’ve covered Resurrection of the Dark Dragon at RPGFan before—see Damian’s 2004 review and Pat’s 2007 review—and these reviews take a deeper look at how it differs from the original. For my review, I used my New Game Plus save file, slightly increasing the difficulty and carrying over the cards I had collected (more on this in a bit). My primary concern is whether developer Amusement Vision (who would later, after multiple restructurings, become Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio) successfully remade the game with its spirit intact.
Spirit is a subjective quality, though. I see it frequently arise in gaming discourse when remakes are the topic du jour: it’s what gamers refer to when they say something doesn’t feel right. Maybe the controls feel off, or the graphics don’t look right. It happens in ports, too. Something, whatever it is, doesn’t feel right. My general experience with the Shining Force fandom informs me that some of the original’s fans think Resurrection of the Dark Dragon has a spirit problem. Do I agree? It’s—unsurprisingly—more complicated than that.
From my experience, Dark Dragon inherits its base gameplay directly from the original: take up to 12 units into turn-based battles, gain experience for damaging and defeating enemies, level up, etc. It’s infinitely familiar to anyone who has ever played a strategy RPG. And while its gameplay might seem rudimentary compared to today’s standards, it’s also pure. It’s one of the reasons gamers consider Shining Force a classic: there’s no bloat in its gameplay.
This leanness extends into other elements as well. Most levels are an appropriate size (only a few are too large, dragging down the pace) and offer several opportunities for strategizing. Shining Force’s narrative is not fancy or groundbreaking (it’s essentially just a tale of good versus evil with some Godly hubris thrown in), but it is engaging. It gives you reason enough to play and clear objectives that drive you from story beat to story beat with no filler.
Appropriately, Amusement Vision didn’t tinker much with these elements while developing Dark Dragon. There are a few new characters and a somewhat expanded storyline, but you won’t be playing Dark Dragon for its new take on an old narrative. Still, it does give it a little more life (chatty protagonist, character development for playable characters, more backstory) without reinventing everything. I’ve no idea if SEGA considers Dark Dragon canon, but I assume the narrative is essentially the same to avoid breaking canon in the rest of the series. I wish they had tweaked the ending a bit to be less cheesy (it is in the original, though!), but again, it is canon.
Mawlock is the one exception here. His narrative role is…strange. He’s introduced early and saves Narsha, Runefaust’s princess, and another new playable character, from certain death. However, his inclusion feels like it’s supposed to shift the narrative. His history and motives are largely unexplored, but he almost feels like a framing device for…something. Ultimately, he’s not that important to the story, even though the narrative makes it feel like he should be. I’m unsure of what Amusement Vision hoped to accomplish with him.
However, his mechanic can shift Dark Dragon’s core gameplay should you use him. Mawlock uses cards, most of which are found by talking to characters, opening chests, defeating enemies with certain characters, etc., and can equip up to four. These cards have multiple uses based on the character on the card. Mawlock can become or clone the character, use one of their abilities (such as spells), or grant the character another move each turn for the rest of the battle. I only used him to grant slow characters another turn, which is quite helpful. It didn’t break the game either or violate its spirit. I stopped using him about halfway through when my spellcasters learned movement spells that made him obsolete.
I didn’t bother to level Mawlock, but his usefulness depends on which cards you acquire. Some cards let you attack from an unlimited distance or cast high-level spells, and I can see how that could quickly become game-breaking should you level him appropriately. Aside from a few areas, you don’t have to use him. You can completely ignore him—a friendly option for new and old Shining Force fans.
However, does he fit the original game’s spirit? No. His narrative role is bizarre, and the card-based gameplay feels out of place. It’s nice that you can choose whether to use him, but…why is he even here in the first place? It’s just such an odd design choice. It’s like Amusement Vision wanted to freshen things up but didn’t commit for fear of alienating the original’s fans.
The original Shining Force is a relatively short and easy game. I wouldn’t call it a cakewalk, but you’ll be fine if you don’t rush and use your units appropriately. I never got a game over in the original nor in Dark Dragon. The latter, however, introduces a New Game Plus mode in which the difficulty increases every time you beat the game. Your collected cards also carry over. Ramping difficulty is yet another strange design choice. I can’t imagine anyone except diehard Shining Force fans beating the game and then immediately diving back in for an ever-so-slightly more challenging experience. That might not pan out anyway, depending on whether you use Mawlock and his cards. Him aside, though, why can’t I pick the difficulty? At the rate I play it, Dark Dragon might be challenging in 2064. These elements don’t make sense for an SRPG, and neither element gels with the original’s spirit.
Unsurprisingly, Dark Dragon’s graphics and soundtrack are different than the original. I’m more generous about respecting the original’s spirit (but you might not be) here for obvious reasons: the GBA is not the Genesis. The two games just aren’t going to look or sound identical. For starters, Dark Dragon is much smoother and less pixelated. Its town and map environments are solid approximations of the originals: some of the textures used in the mountains and forests even repeat like in the Genesis version, which is a nice touch. Movement in towns and the overworld is also no longer restricted to a grid, speeding up travel considerably, perhaps a benefit from how Amusement Vision built the game on the GBA.
Shining Force always stood out for its battle animations, and they’re impressive here but different. I appreciate that the animations have the same sort of delayed, stuttered feeling the originals do, almost like they’re missing a few frames of animation. The backgrounds are entirely redrawn but fit well with the updated character models. The character portraits are a bit more hit-and-miss. I like the refocused angle that focuses on each character’s face, but that angle doesn’t work for everyone. For instance, Darksol’s helmet resembles demonic bunny ears, and I have no idea what Adam’s is supposed to be. Some of the portraits look washed out, too.
Composer Masahiko Yoshimura’s fantasy-sci-fi soundtrack is here, too, and much like the graphics, it’s the same but different. The compositions are just as enjoyable as they were in 1993. The cozy town theme, the rousing battle song, the ominous ruins dirge…it’s not a soundtrack that stays with you forever, but some of its songs are instantly recognizable. The potential issue is that neither the Genesis nor the Game Boy Advance are aural powerhouses. Genesis games always sound a bit tinny and metallic to me. I’m not sure how else to describe it. There’s just a certain quality to them that screams “Genesis” to me. Meanwhile, I find GBA games always sound a bit muffled, like I’m listening to the music from outside the room it’s playing in. So, while the songs are the same, the experience is still different.
Shining Force: Resurrection of the Dark Dragon is a mostly successful remake that preserves the original’s spirit. Despite the change in platform and some odd additions, it still looks, feels, and plays like Shining Force. While this remake doesn’t replace the original, it’s still a worthwhile experience. If you’ve never played Shining Force (if you haven’t, I’m immediately revoking your gamer card—don’t test me), this is as good of a place as any to do so. For you purists, this is mostly the same game you remember but with an SNES-flavored veneer. The spirit of the game you cherish is still here if you can slightly relax your expectations.
